


Very Much Alive

by unknownxcelebrity



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Children of Earth Fix-It, M/M, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-17
Updated: 2015-07-17
Packaged: 2018-04-09 20:29:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4363130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unknownxcelebrity/pseuds/unknownxcelebrity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He had to know how far it went and he slowly reached out with a hand he couldn’t see and immediately brought it back to his side when he felt something just inches in front him. He thought the afterlife was at least a tad bigger than that. At least the size of a bedroom maybe, or a prison cell, not the size of a fucking box.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Very Much Alive

**Author's Note:**

> So a friend learned I was watching Torchwood, and accidentally let it slip that a certain someone dies. I couldn't accept it, no way, no how. So without having a massive amount of Torchwood knowledge, I decided to write up a very short one shot about what I think happened after Ianto's death. Let me believe it, okay?
> 
> If anyone wants this to continue let me know!

Ianto was fucking freezing, he was. That was the first thing that came to his mind as he slowly opened his eyes and was met with nothing but darkness. Then it hit him. He died.

He died in Jack’s arms without ever hearing the words he’d been desperate to hear. Sure, “I’ll remember you until the end time,” was close, as close as he should have ever wanted from Captain Jack Harkness, but dammit, he wanted a plain old “I love you” more than anything.

Death was exactly as Suzie described it. It was just darkness and cold, so fucking cold. He had never felt so alone or so isolated in his entire life, but now in death he was expected to experience this forever. Dear lord, he could not do this forever, it had only been ten minutes and he was already feeling restless, and claustrophobic, as though the world was too big but at the same time, far too small.

Please, he hoped silently, don’t let this be the rest of his eternity. 

He had to know how far it went and he slowly reached out with a hand he couldn’t see and immediately brought it back to his side when he felt something just inches in front him. He thought the world was at least a tad bigger than that. At least the size of a bedroom maybe, or a prison cell, not the size of a fucking box.

Ianto sighed silently to himself and reached out again, intent on learning everything about his world, about his afterlife. This time, when his hand met the barrier, he pressed his entire palm against it and thought it felt rather like a thick canvas. He ran his hand over the length of it, as far as he could reach and discovered that when he pushed upward even further, that the barrier would extend outward for a while until it hit it’s limit. Odd.

He brought his second hand up and began feeling with both of them, and when his fingers encountered an odd textured line somewhere in the middle of the barrier, he spent a fair amount of time studying it until he decided it felt rather similar to a zipper line in a jacket. Definitely odd.

Curiosity had struck him now and with nothing else to do with the rest of...well, forever, he decided to follow the strange line up over his head until his finger ran into a small piece of metal. A zipper? Well, if it was indeed a zipper line then a zipper would be the logical explanation for an ice cold piece of metal, right?

With shaking and stiff fingers, Ianto grabbed the “Zipper” and pulled it toward his feet, smiling to himself when he heard the tell tale sound of two pieces of fabric being zippered apart. Lovely, so the afterlife wasn’t a tiny little area after all.

Once he poked his head out of the opening of his tiny world, Ianto blinked in surprise when he found he couldn’t truly sit up. His head made a loud thunk against a very hard ceiling, whenever he tried. Okay, so maybe the afterlife was still tiny, but at least it wasn’t as dark, even if it was still freezing.

In fact, there was a square of light behind his head, and once he had pulled himself out of the tiny afterlife, he managed to flip over onto his stomach and look at the light for the first time. 

It looked like light filtering through a closed doorway and Ianto was given renewed hope that his afterlife was about to get even bigger. Strange that there were so many damn obstacles to get there, but what else did he really have to do now?

His hands shook as he reached toward the square and once he felt the solid surface he gave it a strong push and hissed as light came flooding in.

Goddamn that hurt!

Slowly, he shuffled forward with his eyes closed and climbed out of the tiny place, only to fall what felt like several feet to the ground.

“Fuck.” He groaned and slowly opened his eyes, only to freeze when he recognized where he was. He was in the freezer room in The Hub. This was where agents were kept after their death, and from the looks of it, he had fallen from one of the top freezers on the left hand wall.

“Don’t fucking move.” A voice said from above Ianto’s head and the young man instinctively flipped around to see Jack standing near the entrance of the room with a gun pointed directly at him. 

Jack.

Was.

Pointing.

A gun.

At him.

Jack. Jack was immortal. Jack couldn’t die. If Jack was here, then….

“What are you?” Jack asked again, but Ianto could only stare blankly at the man he loved so desperately, unable to believe that was laying his eyes on him again. 

“I- I’m Ianto.” He whispered and slowly sat up until he was sitting on the floor with his legs laid out in front of him. “I thought I was dead, I climbed out of the freezer. I don’t- I don’t know what’s- I-” Ianto looked around the room with large eyes, trying to figure out what had happened. Was he dead? Was he alive? If he was dead, why was Jack here? If he was alive, how did that happen? He remembered dying, he remembered….

“Ianto?” Jack whispered and slowly put the gun away in it’s holster before rushing forward and kneeling on the ground in front of Ianto. His eyes were blown wide and his fingers were shaking as they raised up to press against Ianto’s neck and then traveled upward to cup his face. 

“How?”

“I thought you would know.” Ianto whispered. “Am I alive or dead?”

Jack didn’t answer, instead he gripped Ianto’s hand and brought it up to the pulse point on the side of Ianto’s neck, where a steady beat could be felt beneath his finger tips. “You are very much alive.”


End file.
